


fire exists the first in light

by sky_blue_hightops



Category: Endeavour (TV)
Genre: Burns, Cartouche, Endeavour Morse Whump, Episode: s05e02, Father-Son Relationship, Fire, Gen, Hurt Endeavour Morse, Hurt/Comfort, Injury, Whump
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-20
Updated: 2019-10-20
Packaged: 2020-12-27 04:10:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,010
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21112415
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sky_blue_hightops/pseuds/sky_blue_hightops
Summary: Thursday takes a little longer to reach Morse in the Roxy.





	fire exists the first in light

**Author's Note:**

> ASHES denote that fire was;  
Respect the grayest pile  
For the departed creature’s sake  
That hovered there awhile. 
> 
> Fire exists the first in light,  
And then consolidates,—  
Only the chemist can disclose  
Into what carbonates.
> 
> \- Emily Dickinson

He couldn’t breathe. He drew his hands to his chest, fingertips burnt and bleeding, scrabbling for air, but he _ couldn’t breathe _. The fire roared around him, eating hungrily at the theatre around him, flames licking at the wood of the structure and turning years’ worth of memories to soot and ash.

Soot and ash that he was now breathing in, clogging his lungs, depriving him of the air that would so easily clear the growing dark spots from his vision. He trembled on the floor, useless, watching as the beams fell on Gordon. The old man’s uniform caught on fire, and then there wasn’t much to watch at all, and then his arms couldn’t support him anymore and the carpeting was rough and slick with ash against his face.

He curled in on himself, one hand still gripping his chest desperately, the other shielding his head as chunks and pieces of wood and plaster fell around him. Morse couldn’t stop coughing. The raspy end of one fit would trigger another one to start, and he almost blacked out from the pain of his chest caving in. Something wet dripped from the corner of his mouth, something warm and tasting of metal, and he rubbed at it. The red of it smeared on his already-bloody hands, darkening the angry, pink skin.

He was only vaguely aware of the heat around him, blinking rapidly to clear his eyes, dazed from the way the light of the flames seemed to press on them. There was screaming, in his ears. He didn’t know if it was his or Gordon’s, didn’t know which burnt throat the jagged, painful sound was being wrenched from. The sole thing he was certain of, amidst every other sensation vying for his attention, was the smoke that filled his lungs.

He tried to push himself up, against the violent unsteadiness of his arms and the weakness of his grip. He was beginning to feel fuzzy, from the lack of oxygen he supposed, and then there were a few seconds in time that he lost and that resulted in him against the carpet once more. His cognizance came in waves, periods of a bright, pained awareness framed by longer periods of the sticky blackness of unconsciousness. Morse mumbled, calling out as loud as he could with his shattered voice, but there was no one coming. There were no hands helping him off the ground, no one to prick their fingers picking up his sharp, broken pieces, nothing to protect him from the hailstorm of debris he knew would only become more dangerous.

_ Get under something _ , he thought to himself, his voice even sounding scared in his own mind, but it was too dark and hazy with smoke to make out anything beyond fire, fire, fire. He pressed his palms against the carpet, half-crawling and half-dragging himself in the direction he thought the wall to be. He growled, frustrated at how he couldn’t just _ stand _ and walk away. But the strength in his legs had gone, and his head felt like it was floating, and fire licked gently at his clothes. He couldn’t open his mouth to cry out anymore, lest the flames burn his tongue and the soot stain his teeth.

He didn’t have the energy to cough anymore, didn’t have the energy to do much of anything, and there was so much pain he could barely feel that. Gordon had certainly died long ago, or maybe just a few minutes ago, or maybe a few minutes _ was _ long ago, or maybe he was losing his damn marbles before he could even have the chance to die. Because that’s what he would do, wasn’t it? He’d finally chased after the suspect he couldn’t get up and walk away from. Thursday was elsewhere, running after Valdemar, and Morse was here, half-dead, and it was too late.

He curled up tighter, the heights of the theatre dwarfing his form, shivering and insignificant. There were worse ways to go, he mused, his chest feeling like molten lead, but there were certainly better. His lungs felt heavy, like he was trying to breathe in something hot and viscous, and he pawed at his chest, fingers wrestling with his shirt and tie, as if loosening those would do anything to help.

There was a horrible groaning above him. The entire building creaked and shuddered, and fear passed icy and quick through him. Through numb lips passed prayers he hadn’t called to the front of his mind but a few times in the past decades. One time was when he had watched his mother die. Another time was when he had almost watched Thursday die. And this time, he realized bitterly, he couldn’t even get the words out right. Couldn’t make this last attempt at peace. The floor under him shifted dangerously. He remembered with a start the basement under the theatre. If he fell- if he fell-

The flooring crumpled like paper. Dust plumed around him, stirring slowly in the thick air, and he was weightless for a half-second. His shirt caught on the splintered edges of the floor, scraping the stained fabric, tearing at his skin. There was a feeling of nothingness in his stomach, then there was _ pain _ and then there was a voice calling his name, rough and familiar, and then his eyes drifted shut, for just a second…

Loud footsteps sounded in his ears. “Morse!” Hands patted his face and shook his shoulder firmly. “Get up!”

But he didn’t _ want _ to. Everything was awful when he moved, his body protesting even the slightest shift. “Stop whining,” the voice reprimanded. “Nothing ever got done by not moving, lad. Time to get you out of here.”

He was propped up, and then picked up, small and limp in someone else’s hands, and then held against something more forgiving than the roughness of the carpet but still harsh enough to aggravate the burns covering most of his exposed skin. “Shush now.” He realized he’d been whimpering, barely audibly. And his ear was pressed against a chest, and that chest was rumbling gently, and the rumbling was words, but his mind was a bit too scattered for light conversation so he found himself content to let the rumbling do all the talking. “Hold on. The ground’s still unstable. Don’t move too much.”

Well, that was something he could agree with. All the fight bled from his muscles, relief flooding his chest, washing away the fear. He might still die yet, but at least it wouldn’t be alone.

The heat rose around them as they climbed the stairs, and he turned his face away from the flames, breathing against coat fabric, trying the quell the nausea inhaling smoke caused. They paused for a moment, and then there was a bit of soft cloth being pressed against his face. “Breathe through this, there you go.” The handkerchief filtered out a good portion of the ash. The softness on his face was enough to pull him back under. He was so _ tired _, too tired to fight to stay awake or to care much about anything at all. The flames were...warm. And sleep was mercifully without feeling.

The arm braced under his shoulders jostled him. He groaned, pained. “Need you to help, lad, I can’t carry you all this way.” Morse struggled to get his legs under him, fresh adrenaline wiping away the tug of unconsciousness. His arm was pulled over shoulders, and there was a grip on his side, supporting him, and he swayed, coughing convulsively. 

There was so much pressure in his head and chest. A crash rang out behind them and he was urged even faster, feet dragging. He couldn’t suppress the noise of fear at the roof beginning to crumble above them, ducking his head tighter as they limped towards the exit.

The sky above was spaciously dark when they burst out the side door and tumbled into the back alley, and the air was cool and thin against his face. He would’ve sobbed with relief if he wasn’t so busy coughing his lungs up. Blood splattered on the ground below as he did so, muscles knitting into knots. The hand supporting him shifted to thump helpfully at his back, and for a few tense moments all he could do was cling to Thursday and cough and cough and cough.

“Alright, Morse, alright. Steady,” Thursday rasped beside him, voice hoarse. Morse sucked in a few lungfuls of clean air thirstily, only interrupted to hack up some more blood, head spinning. “Breathe.” The hand stopped thumping so hard and instead settled on rubbing, easing taught muscles. “Slow down, now. Just breathe.”

The loud rush of his heartbeat in his ears calmed as he did so. The night air was cold and slippery in his lungs, like water, and he thought he’d never felt anything as good. The fuzzy edges of his vision came back into focus, and for a second he was distracted by the light of the stars above and the police cars nearby.

He only staggered when the pain of his burns and bruising came rushing back. He glanced a look down at himself and turned his gaze away almost immediately, unable to stomach the sight. It wasn’t as bad as it could be, it wouldn’t prove fatal, but being burned alive, dropped a story, and then dragged back out of the fire had done its toll. “Ow,” he gasped out, feeling as if he would be sick.

Whatever hold he had on reality weakened fast. He tried to say as much, but the words came out jumbled and slurred. Voices filtered into his awareness, voices above him, low and hurried. He was on the ground again, he thought. He reached out or at least tried to, and fingers closed gently around his wrist. Someone was telling him to be still, to calm, and then there wasn’t much of anything at all.

***

Fire cut through the murky, inky black of sleep.

Morse cried out, struggling against fabric, wincing at the tug of cloth against his raw skin. A hand clamped down on his arms and he resisted weakly. “Nurse! He’s awake-”

There was a particularly rough drag and he bit down, the taste of blood filling his mouth, to stifle a whimper. A hand on his hair calmed him slightly as a cool, relieving sensation rushed through his veins. Morse slumped back onto the blankets, breathing ragged. He fought the urge to cough.

The state of awareness he ended up in was some halfway place between awake and asleep. He was tired enough so that his eyes refused to open all the way, but alert enough to just make out his governor on a chair at his bedside. Fragments of the theatre came flooding back, images of fire and wooden splinters and thick smoke. The hand in his hair didn’t leave.

He appreciated it, as reluctant as he was to accept it. It reminded him of feeling small on the floor of the Roxy, but instead of from fear it was from feeling protected, and like he might just be safe enough to finally rest.

The endless white of the hospital, the floor and the blankets and the walls, pressed on the edges of his vision. His gaze slid sideways to focus solely on Thursday, flipping the pages of the Sunday newspaper with his free hand. It was easy to leave behind the memories of the theatre like this. It was easy to forget the smell of burning flesh. He breathed in softly and all that filled his nose was the gentle, lemon-y scent of cleaner.

He’d return to work with the usual relentless determination in a few days, or as soon as they’d let him out of this bed. But for now, he was content to let his eyes fall shut, to take in clean air, and to let the white noise of Thursday muttering to himself about the sports page and nurses chattering with patients lull him back to an easy sleep.


End file.
